A Dangerous Method

A Dangerous Method is a 2011 historical film directed by David Cronenberg and starring Keira Knightley, Viggo Mortensen, Michael Fassbender, and Vincent Cassel. The screenplay was adapted by writer Christopher Hampton from his 2002 stage play The Talking Cure, which was based on the 1993 non-fiction book by John Kerr, A Most Dangerous Method: The story of Jung, Freud, and Sabina Spielrein.

The film marks the third consecutive collaboration between Cronenberg and Viggo Mortensen (after A History of Violence and Eastern Promises). This is also the third Cronenberg film made with British film producer Jeremy Thomas, after completing together the William Burroughs adaptation Naked Lunch and the J. G. Ballard adaptation Crash. A Dangerous Method was a German/Canadian co-production. The film premiered at the 68th Venice Film Festival and was also featured at the 2011 Toronto International Film Festival.

Set on the eve of World War I, A Dangerous Method describes the turbulent relationships between Carl Jung, founder of analytical psychology; Sigmund Freud, founder of the discipline of psychoanalysis; and Sabina Spielrein, initially a patient of Jung and later a physician and one of the first female psychoanalysts.

Keira Knightley

Keira Christina Knightley (/ˌkɪərə ˈnaɪtli/; born 26 March 1985) is an English actress. She began acting as a child on television and made her film debut in 1995. She had a supporting role as Sabé in Star Wars Episode I: The Phantom Menace (1999) and her first significant role came in the psychological horror film The Hole (2001). She gained widespread recognition in 2002 after co-starring in the film Bend It Like Beckham and achieved international fame in 2003 after appearing as Elizabeth Swann in the Pirates of the Caribbean film series.

Knightley became known for starring in period dramas such as Pride & Prejudice (2005), for which she earned nominations for the Academy Award for Best Actress and the Golden Globe Award for Best Actress; Atonement (2007), for which she was nominated again for a Golden Globe; Silk (2007); The Duchess (2008); A Dangerous Method (2011); and Anna Karenina (2012). She has also appeared in a variety of other genres, including the romantic comedy Love Actually (2003), as Guinevere in the historical action King Arthur (2004), the psychological thriller The Jacket (2005), biographical action Domino (2005), the historical drama The Edge of Love (2008), the film noir London Boulevard (2010), the dystopian science fiction Never Let Me Go (2010), the romantic drama Last Night (2010), and the dark comedy Seeking a Friend for the End of the World (2012).

Viggo Mortensen

Viggo Peter Mortensen, Jr. (Danish: [viɡ̊o ˈmɒːdnsn]; born October 20, 1958) is an American actor, poet, musician, photographer and painter. He made his film debut in Peter Weir's 1985 thriller Witness, and subsequently appeared in many notable films of subsequent years, including The Indian Runner (1991), Carlito's Way (1993), Crimson Tide (1995), Daylight (1996), The Portrait of a Lady (1996), G.I. Jane (1997), A Perfect Murder (1998), A Walk on the Moon (1999), and 28 Days (2000).

Mortensen grew in prominence in the early 2000s with his role as Aragorn in the epic film trilogy The Lord of the Rings. In 2005, Mortensen won critical acclaim for David Cronenberg's crime thriller A History of Violence. Two years later, another Cronenberg film Eastern Promises (2007) earned him further critical acclaim and a nomination for the Academy Award for Best Actor. A third teaming with Cronenberg in A Dangerous Method (2011) resulted in a nomination for the Golden Globe Award for Best Supporting Actor - Motion Picture. Other well-received films have included Appaloosa (2008), the 2009 film adaptation of Cormac McCarthy's novel The Road, and Far from Men, an adaptation of Albert Camus' short story The Guest.

Sigmund Freud

Sigmund Freud (/ˈfrɔɪd/;German: [ˈziːkmʊnt ˈfʁɔʏt]; born Sigismund Schlomo Freud; 6 May 1856 – 23 September 1939) was an Austrian neurologist and the father of psychoanalysis, a clinical method for treating psychopathology through dialogue between a patient and a psychoanalyst. Freud was born to Galician Jewish parents in the Moravian town of Freiberg, in the Austro-Hungarian Empire. Freud qualified as a doctor of medicine in 1881 at the University of Vienna, and then carried out research into cerebral palsy, aphasia and microscopic neuroanatomy at the Vienna General Hospital. Upon completing his habilitation in 1885, he was appointed a docent in neuropathology and became an affiliated professor in 1902.

In creating psychoanalysis, Freud developed therapeutic techniques such as the use of free association and discovered transference, establishing its central role in the analytic process. Freud's redefinition of sexuality to include its infantile forms led him to formulate the Oedipus complex as the central tenet of psychoanalytical theory. His analysis of dreams as wish-fulfillments provided him with models for the clinical analysis of symptom formation and the mechanisms of repression as well as for elaboration of his theory of the unconscious. Freud postulated the existence of libido, an energy with which mental processes and structures are invested and which generates erotic attachments, and a death drive, the source of compulsive repetition, hate, aggression and neurotic guilt. In his later work Freud developed a wide-ranging interpretation and critique of religion and culture.

Michael Fassbender

Michael Fassbender (born 2 April 1977) is a German–Irish actor of stage and screen whose career includes roles in both independent and blockbuster films.

His feature film debut was in the fantasy war epic 300 (2006) as a Spartan warrior; his earlier roles included various stage productions, as well as starring roles on television such as in the HBO miniseries Band of Brothers (2001) and the Sky One fantasy drama Hex (2004–05). He first came to prominence for his biographical role as IRA activist Bobby Sands in the historical drama Hunger (2008), for which he won a British Independent Film Award for Best Actor. Subsequent roles included the independent film Fish Tank (2009), earning his second BIFA nomination; as a Royal Marines lieutenant in the Quentin Tarantino war film Inglourious Basterds (2009); as Edward Rochester in the 2011 film adaptation of Jane Eyre; as psychiatry innovator Carl Jung in historical drama A Dangerous Method (2011); as a sentient android in the Ridley Scott science fiction film Prometheus (2012); and in the musical comedy-drama Frank (2014) as an eccentric musician loosely inspired by Frank Sidebottom.